


Of Gods and Monsters, Fragment s4,2: January 1st, 2078

by bzarcher, solarbird



Series: Of Gods and Monsters [25]
Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Autistic Satya "Symmetra" Vaswani, Blankets, Canon Lesbian Character, Canon Lesbian Relationship, Conditioning, F/F, False Memories, Fucked Up, Gen, London, Memories, Memory Alteration, Mind Control Aftermath & Recovery, New Year's Eve, New Years, New York City, Oasis (Overwatch), Other, Revelations, Talon Angela "Mercy" Ziegler, Talon Fareeha "Pharah" Amari, Talon Lena "Tracer" Oxton, Talon Satya "Symmetra" Vaswani, Trans Sombra (Overwatch), Unreliable Narrator
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-21
Updated: 2018-05-21
Packaged: 2019-05-09 14:47:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,233
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14718135
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bzarcher/pseuds/bzarcher, https://archiveofourown.org/users/solarbird/pseuds/solarbird
Summary: Moira O’Deorain has won. Her rivals within Talon destroyed, her trio of loyal Weapons - the Changed and copper-eyed Tracer, the silver-eyed Oilliphéist, and golden-eyed Widowmaker - at her command, to remake the world.The Weapons and their friends are hanging out together late on New Year's Eve and into New Year's Day, waiting for the ball to drop in New York, when Sombra starts asking a lot of very carefully considered questions.This story - a side-step/alternate-ending sequel toThe Armourer and the Living Weapon- will be told in a series of eddas, sagas, fragments, texts, and cantos, all of which serve their individual purposes. To follow it as it appears,please subscribe to the series.





	Of Gods and Monsters, Fragment s4,2: January 1st, 2078

"You know,” Sombra said, as she pulled the cork from another bottle of champagne, “We should've just done this as an all day thing. Started with Australia, people could've just come and gone as they liked, until we ended up in Honolulu.”

Fareeha rolled her eyes from the depths of the overstuffed chair she was sharing with Angela, a disposable top hat with ‘HAPPY NEW YEAR’ painted on the band resting crookedly on her head. "Even _your_ livers couldn't have handled that."

Sombra gave a dismissive wave of the bottle. "Psssh. Says the woman drinking sparkling apple juice. Where's your sense of adventure?"

“Generally between five hundred and two thousand meters,” the Huntress deadpanned, carefully reaching around her snoozing wife to put down her cup and pick up a ball of mahjoun from the plate she’d brought to the party.

Lena giggled as she returned to the apartment’s living room, her arms full of blankets. “I still think you should talk to some of the engineering boffins about adding proper atmospheric seals and better antigrav boost to your suit. We could have a lot of fun playin' hide-n-seek at Angels 30.”

Fareeha chuckled as she took a blanket and carefully draped it over Angela, then leaned over to kiss her wife’s temple before she got back to the conversation. “Perhaps someday. But I like how the Mark VII handles right now. We have a good balance of agility, endurance, and firepower.”

“Oh, _come on_ ,” Sombra groaned as she finished putting a blanket over a thoroughly asleep Satya. “It’s New Years Eve! Stop talking _work_.”

“ _You_ were the one who suggested we stay up to see midnight in New York.” Danielle pointed out as she emerged from the kitchen with a plate of cheese and fruit spread for herself, and a dish of ice cream for Emily. “What would you suggest we talk about for another…” She looked over to one of the clocks that Lena had hung up after they’d moved in. “Three hours?”

“I like the Rockin’ New Year,” Sombra insisted. “It’s a whole city out to have a good time and they do it right.” She looked down at her sleeping girlfriend. “We went there for our... fourth date?”

“Fifth,” Satya corrected, stirring but still mostly asleep, before passing back into a deeper slumber.

Emily beamed. “That,” she observed with glee, “was _adorable!_ ”

Sombra snorted as she held up her middle finger, but her blush made it clear how she really felt. “Okay, okay, maybe we _should_ talk about work.” She gestured over to Danielle, who had happily wedged herself between her wives. “Like... I gotta say, araña, I've been wanting to ask this for a while - I never saw you as the loyal Talon type, not after everything they did to make you. I mean, I was always just using Talon for my own purposes, but you - you're a _believer_. How'd _that_ happen?"

Danielle reached for her champagne flute, accepting a refill and taking a sip before she answered. “In no small part, because this is _not_ the Talon which kidnapped my former self.”

Lena nodded agreement from her corner of the couch, a can of Guinness in her hand. “Talon's not what it was, luv. Mum and Danielle and Emily and I - we saw to that. I mean, after all, that was the whole point of... " she waved her free hand around. "Of workin' together. At least, 'til we found out about Mei's data. Then it got even more important."

Emily giggled. “Could you imagine... oh, god, what was his name? The Italian bloke. Could you imagine him agreeing to any of this?”

Sombra tilted her head. “Italian bloke?”

“Yah!” Emily put down the empty ice cream dish. “The bloke with the big office in Venice. The one who -”

“ _Oh._ ” Lena interrupted, her face darkening. “ _That_ bugger? No. Not even a little. If he’d still been around, I’d have happily put him on the list, though. Be a bloody requirement, in fact.”

Sombra sat up, her amethyst gold eyes full of interest. “Bartalotti? The old chair, the one Blackwatch killed? What did he ever do to you, rápida?”

Lena’s free hand found Danielle’s, squeezing it tightly, for reassurance. “Bastard cost me almost ten years of my family is what. Him, Reyes, and that whole mess.” She shook her head. “Him, yeah - _he_ was old Talon right to the bone. Almost as bad as Akande and Gabriel."

"Perhaps worse," Danielle said, "in some ways."

"The three of _them_ being dead?" Tracer held up her Guiness, in a mocking toast. "That, I’m just fine with.”

Sombra frowned as she put the half empty bottle of champagne down on the floor beside her. “Maybe I had a little too many of these already, but I don’t follow. How’d Blackwatch taking out a Talon bigwig cause you to lose your family? I thought your biological parents died in the Crisis, and...”

“Never even knew 'em,” Lena confirmed. “I've got... kind of a vague impression of my birth mother? Nothing solid, though. But my _mum_..."

She shifted to sit up a bit straighter. "See, until that whole mess? I still thought she’d still been working with Overwatch, in research - that's all she ever talked about. Didn’t know she’d moved into Blackwatch, and sure as _hell_ didn't know she was bein' some kind of field operative.”

 _Ahhhh,_ Sombra thought to herself. _That’s interesting._ She picked up the wine and took another drink, thinking of the best angle to learn more. “So when you turned on the news and there she is, giving some poor Talon goon the bad succ…”

Fareeha blanched. “I will give you fifty Euros to please _never_ call it that again.”

Sombra just winked and waited for Lena to pick up the story.

“Yeh.” Lena finished her beer with a sigh, and put the can down on the coffee table. “I was... well. No other word for it - I was bloody furious. About her lying, about the op, about _all of it._ Overwatch was supposed to be doing the _right_ thing, not sneakin’ around at night lookin’ for revenge." She scowled down at the tabletop. "When she finished getting drummed out, she tried to come see me up at Coningsby, where we were doing the _Slipstream_ airframe trials, and... I wouldn’t even let them bring her through th' gate.”

"So you were completely out of contact with each other for... years, then."

“Mmhmm.” Lena nodded, confirming. “Didn't talk for ages. And even though I was the one who’d told her to piss off the first time... when she didn’t even try to show up an’ help Winston get me home... well. That was th' low. I kind of figured we were done.” She picked up her beer again, and took another pull. "'Course, by then, she was working with Talon at its worst, and couldn't."

 _That, and she didn’t even know who you were at the time,_ Sombra thought, as she took another sip of her own drink. _This is turning into a **very** informational morning._ “Okay, I sort of get that. But aside from Antonio being a slimebag... how was it Gabe’s fault?”

Lena shrugged. “He’s the one who told her to lie about what she was doin’ with Blackwatch. He’s the one who decided to shoot the bastard instead of the quiet snatch an’ grab, and then, after he helped tear my adopted family apart, he's the one who blew up my found family for his encore.”

“Ahh. So you blame him for the battle at Geneva HQ, too?”

Lena nodded. “Jack can be a bit of a wanker if he’s in a mood, but he didn’t lead a bloody dawn assault on his own house.” 

Sombra snorted. “Suppose there’s that.” She tilted her head. _Let’s see how deep the rabbit hole goes._ “So... you and Moira were done. How’d you patch it up?” 

Lena took a long breath, and chewed a little on her own lower lip. “Time heals all wounds,” she said, eventually, with a soft, almost mournful seriousness to it. “Particularly after losin’ so much, in so many bloody ways." She leaned back against the couch. "I spent a lot of time between the Fall and the Recall just... tryin' to figure out who I really was. What I could do. How I could go on."

She paused, and took another drink, before going on.

"Eventually, I just stopped being so bleedin' angry at her... at a lot of things, honestly.... and... well." She smiled, just a little. "I’d already found myself fallin' for tall, blue, and gorgeous here, and...”

Sombra smirked as she gestured to the two other women on the couch. “Which one?”

“Oh, Wids first,” Emily answered. “Obviously. She and I were already involved, but you know that part.”

Sombra frowned. “But... weren’t you, like, rápida's cousin, or something?”

“Not by blood, but... technically?” Emily looked over at Lena, her eyes slightly unfocused from both the attempt to recall memories before her own rebirth and the hash candy she’d tried. “And yah, we knew _of_ each other - even met once or twice - but auntie didn’t get away from her work much, and I was in special schools most of the time, whereas Lena here went to independent, and then I decided to go into the Forces pretty early on, so...”

Lena nodded. “Signed up at fourteen, didn't you?”

“Fifteen,” Emily corrected. “Forged papers to claim I was sixteen so I could get a combat branch posting, and wasn’t _that_ a mess. Auntie was _mad_ when she found out." She giggled. "Still amazed I didn’t get caught.” 

Sombra gave a soft little ‘huh.’ _That’s true, at least. I found those records. Interesting how much she’s made up to go with it._ “It’s still kind of funny you two ended up together.” She grinned evilly at the two of them. “It’s very _royal_ of you.” 

“Oh, _piss off_.” Lena shot back a two-finger salute, before she stuck out her tongue. “Anyway," she snorted. "With me and Danielle gettin' well and firmly _together_ , bein’ angry at mum because she was still part of Talon started feelin' a bit hypocritical.” She looked over at one of the darkened windows, fully polarised to black, keeping up the illusion of New Year's Eve. “Especially once _she_ came to _me_ and apologized for... well. Everything, really. And told me what she wanted to do, to, to, to fix Talon. To make it right. And I believed her, and I'm... gods, I'm glad I did."

She looked over at Emily, and got a small nod in return, before continuing. "After that... and knowin' we _had_ to stop Akande and Reyes, and Overwatch onboard with that, I really thought…”

Tears started to fill her eyes, and she blinked several times as she tried to clear them away, her voice growing thick with regret.

“We could've worked _together_. If Winston had made it - if that _absolute bastard_ Reyes hadn’t decided to try to sneak in an’ ambush us while we were talking in the first place... I think we could have made things work. We'd stopped th' second Crisis. With Winston there, Overwatch, and what was left of Talon, the parts we could fix... the parts we _have_ fixed... we could have figured out ways to work together. To do what we’re doin’ now, workin' to fix the damage done." She put her hands to her face, trying not to cry. "To make that better world we _all_ wanted.”

Lena shook her head and let Danielle pull her back down into a hug, Emily’s lighter blue fingers carding through her hair. She let herself be soothed by their touch, then, after a few moments, shook her head as she turned back to Sombra again. “Sorry, I still get a bit... y’know. Listen to me, it’s supposed to be a party and I’m all drunk and maudlin.” 

“Hey, I asked,” Sombra reassured her, reaching across the floor to put a hand on her knee. “Sorry to dig up old pain like that.” She looked over to where Fareeha had been quietly listening to the conversation, her eyes looking a bit glassy as she chewed on another mahjoun ball. “Actually... where _is_ Moira tonight?” 

“Oh,” Fareeha answered with a lazy little smile. “The three of us went out for dinner, first. She came here with us, but left before you arrived - she usually likes to be in bed by one or two at the latest." Angela stirred and mmmed, just a little, and Ree brushed her wife's forehead with her fingertips. "Staying up for London was already a bit much for her - especially after we ordered the qusi.” Her smile turned to a grin as she glanced back up to Lena. “Your mother didn’t quite understand that when they said ‘roast lamb’, they meant the _whole_ lamb.”

Lena giggled, her mood quickly bouncing back. “Oh, I would have loved to see the look on her face!”

"It was pretty amusing," the rocketeer agreed. " _I_ ordered dessert."

"There was room?" Emily asked, disbelieving. "After an entire bloody lamb?"

" _Someone_ ," she looked down at her sleeping wife, "wanted chocolate."

 _Well. Now I know what O'Deorain did to their memories,_ Sombra considered, as the others laughed, and the conversation returned to happier topics. _It explains a **lot** , really.._

_But the question is, still... what can I **do** with that?_

**Author's Note:**

> To follow this story, [subscribe to the series via this link](https://archiveofourown.org/series/972024), rather than to the individual eddas or sagas.


End file.
